Now that Chloe is back in business I'm super psyched for news on DIRT. Any updates Chloe since finding a job?

No updates yet. Focusing on Intangible related stuff and getting a pipeline going for Cyan to accept fan content into MOULa first. The benefits of that of course is that most of the Intangible stuff is also going to find its way onto DIRT, perhaps in a slightly altered form in order to accommodate the new start up design. Though thats mostly for Descent more than any other age.

I was looking at some of your DIRT pictures again yesterday, and noticed something.

Specifically, it was the integration of the Baron's Office into Ae'gura. I realized that you'd placed it far lower than it is supposed to be. Your model shows the windows about level with the catwalk over the palace alcove stairs. Where those windows are in the picture, anyone at the top of the alcove stairs would be able to look up and over into them and wave to Sharper while he was in his "secret" office.

In the live model for the office, the outside backdrop shows the top roof of the palace well below it, and it's also far above the Tokotah rooftop where the DRC translators worked. It's easy to see down onto both from the windows.

To get the approximate angles shown in the Baron's Office model, it would have to be up around the highest windows on the northwest face of the Guild Hall complex, below and to the right of the capital structure.

Here's the general area I mean. It would have to be somewhere around here to have the view it does.

It's placement was chosen as the best place to get the best possible angle without changing too much of the existing structures.

If its placement was to be exact to all existing sources you would be wrong as well as myself, as the GZ coordinates for the Baron City office place it above the guild hall, and in fact not to far below the GZ itself. Which of course is impossible for it to be located and get the view on the backdrop.

As far as seeing into the windows from below, there's an outcrop of rock, just below the windows that blocks the view from the stairs, you can however see it from in the center of the courtyard, but with those style windows you'd have been able to see it regardless of its placement on the mountain. So the idea that its placement is "secret" doesn't really work in terms of story.

It's placement was chosen as the best place to get the best possible angle without changing too much of the existing structures.

Except that it doesn't have the best possible angles. Where you have it placed, it's impossible to see the top of the palace roof, which is clearly visible from the left window in the live model. Your placement puts it level with upper floors of the palace, and well below the roof it looks down upon in the live model.

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If its placement was to be exact to all existing sources you would be wrong as well as myself, as the GZ coordinates for the Baron City office place it above the guild hall, and in fact not to far below the GZ itself. Which of course is impossible for it to be located and get the view on the backdrop.

The KI coordinates for the office are one of the few major flubs on the part of Cyan. The direction reading crosses over the map table in the Museum, and the distance and height readings place the office in mid-air, looking down on the plateau behind the capital structure. While I'm a usually a proponent for trusting virtually all of the KI coordinates in the game, that's one that has to be disregarded because it's flat out impossible.

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As far as seeing into the windows from below, there's an outcrop of rock, just below the windows that blocks the view from the stairs, you can however see it from in the center of the courtyard, but with those style windows you'd have been able to see it regardless of its placement on the mountain. So the idea that its placement is "secret" doesn't really work in terms of story.

Not if you are standing in the palace alcove, right at the top of the stairs and near the palace wall. The windows would be visible from there, as well as anyone inside the office who passed near them. The room around the desk would not be visible because of the angle, but that's about it. The ledge you mentioned is very narrow.

In terms of story... It's an integral part of the Uru back story that Sharper used it as a secret office where he kept things he didn't want the DRC to find. For someone in the courtyard to be able to see someone moving in there would break the game's canon "history".

Anyway, that's enough from me. I brought it to your attention, and that's all I was after. Whether you do anything about it is up to you.

The tumblr page still exists, although it's been renamed; it's now located at dirturulive-blog.tumblr.com. (that said, it hasn't been updated since 2014, and I have no idea if it's returning any time soon; I understand Chloe has been busy with more important things)

I'm not going to hold my breath while waiting. IIRC what the members have said in the past, a number of the people who collaborated in the project dropped out for various reasons, leaving something like two or three trying to fit work on it into their schedules. Also, the decision of Cyan to include some of their work into Uru sidetracked DIRT as they began concentrating on things that could made to fit Cyan's needs in a reasonable amount of time. Given that the provisional deadline Cyan gave us a few conventions back has long since passed, it must have been much harder than they believed at the time.